Research is producing 'effective cancer treatments'

By highlighting the drop in cancer mortality rates over two decades, Cancer Research UK is hoping to demonstrate the importance of research in helping to beat the disease.

Today cancer is not the death sentence people once believed it to be.

As these new figures show, mortality rates from this much-feared disease are dropping significantly as the fruits of research are producing more effective treatments with fewer side-effects.

But while we're heading in the right direction, too many lives are still being lost to the disease, highlighting how much more work there is to do.

Our aim is that, one day, everyone will beat cancer and the more research we can fund, the sooner that day will come.

– Harpal Kumar, Cancer Research UK chief executive

A one-off bowel-scope test, now being introduced, could further cut the number of deaths from the disease by 43% and new cases of bowel cancer by a third, the charity said its own study on bowel cancer screening has shown.